Virgin Business Broadband

virgin business broadband
Virgin Business Broadband is one of the most popular services in the UK. But is it right for your business?

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Virgin Media is a popular and reputable telecommunications company that offers a range of TV and broadband services for both home and business users. In this Virgin Business Broadband review, we look exclusively at their broadband packages for small businesses and how they compare to other UK providers.

In this review…

Virgin Business Broadband Review

Choosing the right broadband as a small business is important. You ideally want affordable prices, a reliable service, and great speeds. Virgin Business Broadband can offer this.

It has some of the best download speeds available for basic broadband packages at 350 Mbps. Also, despite having faster basic speeds than most other providers, its prices are still competitive.

About Virgin Business Broadband

Virgin is one of the most easily recognizable brands worldwide. Founded by Sir Richard Branson, this global company has many branches including Virgin Atlantic, Virgin Media, and Virgin Money. It covers a wide range of industries, but in the UK it is possibly best-known for its telecommunications services and transatlantic flights.

Virgin Business Broadband is part of the Virgin Media Business company. This company offers a range of different services for small to enterprise businesses including broadband, phone line systems, mobile contracts, and WiFi solutions.

Virgin Business Broadband Plans, Prices & Features

Virgin Business Broadband has a simple set of plans that a split into four different tiers. Their business broadband is known as Voom, and each package is available as standalone broadband, or with a digital phone line and unlimited UK calls. You can see the basic prices below for each tier, both with and without an included phone line:

Basic Voom plans without a phone line

  • Voom Fibre 1: £32 per month – 350 Mbps Download, 20 Mbps Upload, Dynamic IP
  • Voom Fibre 2: £47 per month – 350 Mbps Download, 30 Mbps Upload, Dynamic or Static IP
  • Voom Fibre 3: £50 per month – 350 Mbps Download, 40 Mbps Upload, Dynamic or Static IP
  • Voom Fibre 4: £62 per month – 500 Mbps Download, 50 Mbps Upload, Dynamic or Static IP

Upgraded Voom plans with a phone line

  • Voom Fibre 1: £39 per month – 350 Mbps Download, 20 Mbps Upload, Dynamic IP
  • Voom Fibre 2: £54 per month – 350 Mbps Download, 30 Mbps Upload, Dynamic or Static IP
  • Voom Fibre 3: £57 per month – 350 Mbps Download, 40 Mbps Upload, Dynamic or Static IP
  • Voom Fibre 4: £69 per month – 500 Mbps Download, 50 Mbps Upload, Dynamic or Static IP

The first thing to notice here is that Virgin Business Broadband offers far greater download speeds than its competitors as standard. For example, Sky has a maximum speed of 75 Mbps. As standard – even with the basic Voom Fibre 1, you still get amazing download speeds of 350 Mbps.

The upload speeds are OK too and as you progress through the tiers, the upload speed increases. Customer support response times also improve as you progress through the tiers. For example, Voom Fibre 1 includes a resolution time of 48-hours, Voom Fibre 2 has a resolution time of 24-hours, and Voom Fibre 4 has a resolution time of 12 hours.

It is also worth noting that you can choose from either a dynamic or static IP address for Plans 2 to 4. However, the basic Voom Fibre 1 only offers a dynamic IP address. This will not matter to most small businesses, however, IT companies may require a static IP for networking, etc.

Lastly, one drawback is that none of the Voom Fibre plans include a 4G mobile backup. This is available for an additional £7 per month regardless of the plan you choose. Other providers like BT Business Broadband do include this in some of their plans for free.

UK Phone Line & 4G Backup

As stated, you can purchase a Virgin Business Broadband package either with or without a phone line. The price to include a phone line is only an extra £7 per month which is reasonable.

For this, you get a dedicated phone line and unlimited UK calls. This applies to UK landlines, and UK mobile networks, and also text messages and data allowance.

The 4G backup is a further £7 per month. As a result, if you want a phone line and backup, you can add an extra £14 per month to the basic Voom Fibre prices. The 4G backup works much in the same way as the service offered by other providers like BT and Sky.

Essentially, if for whatever reason your broadband connection goes down, you can switch to the 4G backup connection and still have internet connectivity for your business.

Virgin Business Broadband Pros & Cons

You should now have a clear idea of the different packages and features offered by Virgin Business Broadband. However, what is the benefits and drawbacks of this service? To help show this clearly, we have listed the pros and cons below: 

Pros

  • Faster speeds than competitors
  • Reasonable prices for their basic plans
  • Unlimited downloads
  • High-quality Hitron WiFi Router included

Cons

  • 4G backup is not available as standard in any price plans
  • 48-hour resolution time for Voom Fibre 1 is not fantastic
  • Minimum contract term of 24 months

Pros

Firstly, one of the best points about Virgin Business Broadband is the download speeds. Even the basic Voom Fibre 1 has fantastic download speeds of 350 Mbps. This is far greater than other providers and you typically have to pay a premium to get download speeds like this. If you have heavy internet usage, the fast downloads speeds are certainly a plus.

Secondly, the Virgin Business Broadband plans are reasonably priced. For £32 per month, you get download speeds of 350 Mbps and unlimited data. This is great value for money and if you compare it to BT, Sky, and Vodafone, for example, it’s one of the most affordable high-speed options available.

Thirdly, one of the main benefits is that you get unlimited downloads. Combine this with the fast download speeds and it makes for the perfect package for high-volume business users. 

We also like that included Hitron WiFi router. This is relatively easy to set up and provides an excellent WiFi connection for your premises.

Cons

Although there are many positives, Virgin Business Broadband is not perfect. For example, you do not get the 4G backup connection in any of the plans. This can only be purchased as an additional extra at £7 per month. While this isn’t a huge amount, it increases your monthly bill, and other providers do offer this as standard.

We would also like to see some improvement to the customer support. For the Voom Fibre 1 package, you get a guaranteed resolution time of 48-hours. This is not exactly quick – especially if you have a critical issue and your business is reliant on internet connectivity.

Lastly, like other providers, Virgin Business Broadband plans are only available for a minimum contract of 24-months. This is less than ideal for new small businesses. However, it does not appear that any UK providers currently offer anything shorter than this!

Is Virgin Business Broadband Right for my Business?

So is Virgin Business Broadband suitable for your business? That depends on your type of business, and your internet needs.

If your business relies heavily on internet usage and expects to download a large amount of data daily, the fast 350 Mbps download speeders offered by Virgin could be a huge benefit. Combine this with decent upload speeds and you essentially have a broadband service that can easily cater to your requirements.

However, if you only need basic internet for occasional use, Virgin may not be the best option. It is still affordable, but there are other providers that offer simpler packages that could be useful for this type of business.

Lastly, if you want to keep your broadband and phone line services with one provider, we would recommend adding the Virgin phone line to your package too. At £7 per month, this isn’t too expensive and for a small business, you get the benefit of unlimited UK calls. By purchasing this bolt-on, you can keep your telecommunications services with one provider for ease of use and convenience.

Compare Virgin Business Broadband

We have shown in great detail what Virgin Business Broadband has to offer. But how does it compare to other UK broadband providers? We have outlined some of the main comparisons below:

  • Virgin Business Broadband offers faster basic download speeds at 350 Mbps compared to BT (76 Mbps), and Sky (76 Mbps).
  • Virgin does not offer a 4G backup as standard whereas some BT packages do include this.
  • They also do not offer any standard packages that include a phone line – this is a paid extra at £7 per month, whereas Sky and BT both offer this as standard in select packages.
  • Like other UK broadband providers, Virgin Business Broadband only offers a minimum 24-month contract.
  • Check out Plusnet broadband as an alternative.

If this review of Virgin business broadband helped you, please recommend DigitalSupermarket.

Compare Business Broadband

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